Does the mechanical girl dream of the Messiah?

The scene in her dream flashed through Lunicia's mind again.

Those were not hazy and unclear dreams that would break and disperse like bubbles when one wakes up. They were like solid ice. Even if the morning light called awakening had already projected over, it would be difficult to melt them completely. Even if they melted, there would still be a pool of cold water left as proof of their existence.

Those people she failed to save, the little girl, the knights who served under her, and...

and her travel companions.

When she saw Ashlee's figure disappear, even though she knew it was just a dream, it was as if a hole opened in her heart that could not be filled even with eternity, as if everything was draining away from that hole, leaving only a meaningless shell. Uneasy, fearful, and even desperate, these emotions gathered in her heart one by one at that moment, and finally condensed into tears. At first, she was angry and wanted to ask why, but then she was left with only sadness, a sadness that even she herself could not understand, not only for herself, not only for Ashlee, but also for other things that Lunisia could not understand yet.

It was like something that had been building up exploded at that moment.

This doesn't make sense, doesn't it?

She was just a travel companion whom I had known for less than a week. Even though she had the same face, delicate body, nice voice, and reliable abilities as me, she was ultimately just a travel companion on this short journey. Would I be so sad because of her?

But no matter how much you doubt it, tears really exist.

She wanted to make some excuses. As a knight, it seemed unacceptable for her to lose her composure in front of a lady. But she finally chose to give up. She also opened her arms and hugged the cold, pale and delicate body in front of her, letting her fingertips involuntarily clasp the smooth back. She did not sob or speak, but just waited for her tears to dry.

"This is a comforting technique retrieved from the database."

Ashlee did not reject the hug. On the contrary, she also increased the strength of her hands a little, trying to make Lunicia feel more real.

——Her voice is a little different.

Different from the voice in the dream, it sounded a bit cold and mechanical, allowing people to vaguely sense the fact that she was a mechanical puppet.

Of course, it didn't matter. No matter which one it was, she didn't mean to hate it.

"Care to tell us about your dream, Luna?"

Of course, there was nothing wrong with this, so Lunicia leaned over to Ashlee's ear and whispered to her about her dreams last night, those lingering scenes.

Ashtherin didn’t miss a word of what she said.

Wiping away the last tear from Lunicia's face with a handkerchief, Ashlee leaned over to her ear and whispered:

"Then please protect me, take me away, take me to the end of the journey, my traveling companion, the chosen one."

I always feel like there's something else behind his words.

"from now on?"

Just like the curtain of a stage was drawn, the sounds outside the hotel also reached Lunicia's ears.

There were sounds of flames, sounds of shouting and killing, sounds of weapons clashing, and sounds of triggers being pulled.

The smell of fire and ashes intertwined, the sweetness of blood and grain intertwined, and together they wrote everything that Lunisia perceived.

A prologue called chaos.

Chapter 22: Engagement

Strictly speaking, this feeling is not familiar to Lunicia, but that feeling will never be forgotten once experienced. It is deeply engraved in Lunicia's brain and soul like a brand. Only a slight similarity can evoke that feeling, that memory, those things that she is unwilling to forget from the depths of her soul.

Waterwheel channel.

The former waterwheel canal.

The ghouls started a feast in the city, and the followers of the Holy Family tortured and killed the survivors. Flames spread through the streets, and lives died one after another. The smell of decay gradually replaced the smell of the living, becoming an eternal presence in the ruins, making it a sanctuary for the Twins of Blasphemy.

It was precisely because she had experienced that kind of taste that Lunicia could immediately judge that a similar thing was happening in the city where she was called Nosawi.

This immediately woke Lunicia up, and she looked up at Asheselin, who gave her an affirmative look. Guiding her in this aura of disaster, taking her to her distant hometown, to her former home, this was what Asheselin hoped for, and it was also the consolation she gave to Lunicia.

She quickly put on her armor with the help of Ashetherin, wiped her face with a wet wipe, put some refreshing lozenges into her mouth, and finally put the giant sword, which was several inches longer than her height, on her back.

"...Ashe, do you want to come with us?"

Before leaving the room, Lunicia turned around as if she remembered something, and asked softly while looking at the face that looked like her own.

"'It is my great pleasure.'"

That is "Haya", the language said to belong to a clan of ancient giants. It is noble and beautiful, with an unspeakable mystery.

Ashlee Lin was pinching the air with her fingertips as if she was pinching the hem of her skirt. In her hands, a gauze as thin as a cicada's wing was interwoven out of thin air. The light and transparent dress enveloped her body. The light and transparent gauze skirt was made up of countless layers of overlapping gauze. It did not have the function of covering her body, but was just extremely beautiful.

There was nothing on her body that needed to be covered up, because of its imperfections, and she didn't seem to mind showing these imperfections to her fellow travelers.

Somehow, the charm of the language and clothes mixed together made the knight feel hot on his face.

……

"How is it? Can you feel where the core of the chaos is?"

"Someone arranged the prayer interference." Ashlee stretched out her finger and pointed in a direction. In Lunicia's memory, that was the direction leading to the city hall. "Go here. Logically speaking, what happened here is very likely related to the city lord, Count Kuridel."

"Feel the same."

Lunicia nodded, took Ashlee's hand, and ran along the road.

"But I want to go to the refugee camp first. If something really happens, there is no defense there."

Her mind flashed back to what happened before she came to Nosawi: armed men of unknown origin attacked her and Ashleelin, and when she finally managed to keep one of them alive and was about to ask about their origins, the other party committed suicide by taking poison.

She always felt that the attackers might have something to do with the current situation.

The situation in the city was quite strange - most of the shops were closed, and a few had their doors open, looking like they had been looted. Corpses were everywhere, some lying on the roadside like garbage, with fatal wounds visible on their bodies, and blood was flowing down the clogged sewers, and no one knew where it would eventually end up.

Some of the bodies looked like civilians and vendors, some were unknown people wearing light armor and holding simple spears, and a small number were garrison soldiers wearing full armor. It was noon, and the Hernand Commercial Street, which should have been crowded with people, was empty, leaving only corpses on the ground and merchants with closed doors and windows and open magic restrictions.

The strong smell of blood stimulated Lunicia's nerves, and she couldn't help but frowned.

In her field of vision, a small group of people were running from the other side of the street. Judging from their attire and the shields and spears in their hands, they were undoubtedly the garrison of Nosawi.

The other party's mission should be to guard the safety and stability of Nosawi, which reduced the possibility of Lunisia being hostile to them. Even so, Lunisia still did not completely let down her guard against them. She secretly put her right hand on the hilt of the giant sword. While running, she whispered to Ashlee, "Ashe, hide behind me."

After receiving an affirmative answer from Ashetherin, she continued to shout to the oncoming defenders: "I am an adventurer, what happened here before!"

At the same time, the guards also saw Lunicia's presence, but their reactions were very different.

"She is the one mentioned earlier, the woman who appeared at the City Hall last night. She is one of the key suspects."

The leading guard's face changed. He reached out and pulled down his mask while calling out to the soldiers behind him: "Attention everyone, there are two enemies ahead. Remember, kill them without mercy."

Upon hearing this, the soldiers pulled down their masks, raised their shields and lances, and entered combat mode.

No one raised any objection to the captain's order, even though they seemed to be just two women who posed no danger at all. Since they had been included in the list of important suspects, they were definitely not people that they could show mercy to.

"The other party has listed us as one of the primary targets of attack." Ashlee reminded, "There is no possibility of negotiation."

"I can tell."

Lunicia said this, but she had no intention of tightly gripping the hilt of the sword.

The sound of footsteps continued to echo in the empty street, and the distance between the two sides kept shortening. On one side were armed guards who had already entered a full combat state and were constantly using sprints to increase the lethality of their spears. On the other side, they seemed to have not entered a combat state at all, and both their expressions and bodies were extremely relaxed, and even the steps they took looked like light steps.

The distance shortens, shortens, and shortens again.

Until it shortens to zero.

Five long spears stabbed out at the same time, pointing at the head, the heart, the abdominal cavity, the left leg and the right leg. The next moment, the girl's body would be pierced through by the simultaneous stabbing of the iron spears, becoming a lifeless corpse.

This is inevitable, the captain of the guard thought.

No matter what the opponent's abilities were, even if the first round of thrusts failed to kill her directly, the other five soldiers behind him were ready to end her life with swords and crossbows at any time.

The figure behind her, with a strange torso and wearing transparent clothes, looks like a vase with no fighting power at all, so there is no need to worry about any trouble. Yes, yes, that's how the battle is, the outcome is determined from the beginning.

Blood gushed out, the red blood like a spring watering the earth, and the fishy smell of the disappearance of life was overwhelming.

——Yes, yes… hm?

No.

It wasn't the girl who fell to the ground.

The one who shed blood could not be a young girl.

In a split second that no mortal eye could possibly capture, Lunicia's hands had already accomplished everything that needed to be accomplished: she gripped the hilt with all her strength, pulled out the sword as quickly as possible, let the sacred energy flow through her arms into the blade, completed the release of the "blessing", and finally, let the sword, which was taller than her body, slash down at a speed beyond the naked eye.

The five iron spears were cut in two from the middle.

The bodies of the five soldiers were cut in half from the waist to the shoulders.

The hardness of steel, the protection of armor, morale, experience, and trained bodies... these enable them to possess strength far beyond that of ordinary people. Even when facing armed criminals or mobs, they can easily fight one against many, not to mention when multiple people form an assault formation together.

However, they all underestimated the seemingly frail girl in front of them.

The team leader didn't even have time to react to what was happening. He just relied on instinct to pull out the sword from his waist when he saw the guards in front of him being cut into two pieces, preparing to engage in close combat.

Just as he swung his sword, the girl's figure disappeared.

All that was left in his field of vision were five bodies lying on the ground and a strange girl who was as pure and flawless as a night-blooming cereus and was staring at him with emotionless golden eyes.

It was not until then that he discovered in a trance that the two girls had faces that looked exactly the same.

When he finally turned around, the sword was already at his neck.

In the moment he turned around, four of his five remaining subordinates were cut in half by swords, and the remaining one had his jaw knocked out by a punch, leaving only half of his face as he lay limp on the ground.

After a brief battle, Lunicia's sword, face, and hands were all stained with blood, but not a single drop of that blood belonged to her.

"Why are you attacking us?"

She stared at the young captain in front of her with a serious expression.

Undoubtedly, the pressure was overwhelming. Even the team leader, who had enough combat experience and had never backed down when facing the most vicious gangsters in the North District, could feel his legs shaking.

"Because, because..."

Just when he was about to say something, Ashlee rushed over from his side, fell to the ground holding Lunicia's body, and with a loud bang, the captain's head exploded into pieces. The power of that blow was so great that after smashing the captain's head, it also blew through an empty house behind him.

"It's sniping, Luna."

Ashethelin quickly condensed a translucent crystal shield in her hand, and the next moment, the crystal shattered, and one of Ashethelin's arms exploded along with it, turning into a piece of scrap metal shining with a faint blue glow.

"It's a puppet of the Iron Leviathan."

Chapter 23: Iron Wave (Part 1)

The flying debris deeply irritated Lunicia. She pulled Ashlee's body into her arms, and then jumped to the side. The next moment, a piercing noise erupted from where they were just now. A deep pit as big as a bathtub instantly appeared there. Rocks flew everywhere, and dazzling purple light was splashing like blood, which evaporated in the blink of an eye.

This didn't feel like magic in any way, but it was also different from the shooting weapons that Lunicia knew - at least she didn't see any visible ammunition. Even if it was an air gun, it was still firing ammunition, not air.

There was hardly any hesitation in Lunicia's movements. From the three shots just now, she had roughly determined the sniper's position - right in the direction leading to the slums, and there was more than one.

There were at least two snipers aiming at her and Ashlee in her arms.

With no time to adjust her body, she could only roll over on the ground with Ashetherin. The basin-sized hole once again covered their previous position, but this failure also gave Lunicia a chance. She quickly stabilized her body, picked up Ashetherin, and then ran quickly.

boom!boom!boom!boom!

The sounds of the ground exploding were very short, and Lunicia had no time to turn back to confirm the location of the crater. Not only did she have to turn around in the few shelters on the street, she also had to find an opportunity to place Ashtherin and launch a counterattack against the opponent.

——Judging from the intervals between the sounds, there should be two snipers, one on the left and one on the right, firing cross-fire.

call out--!

An energy bullet flew past Lunicia's head almost at a distance, and even though there was still quite a distance, the storm caused by the bullet still left a long blood mark on her face.

And this was the last bullet that Lunicia had to face. She suddenly jumped to the side and then rushed into the forked alley next to her with Ashatherine.

"Ashe! Are you okay?!"

It was only then that Lunicia had the energy to care about Ashetherin's injuries.

The left hand was blown into pieces along with half of the forearm. The port was jagged and the dark metal structure was covered with numerous cracks of varying sizes. A faint blue fluorescence seeped out from the cracks. Even though there was no bleeding, it still made Lunicia dizzy. The feeling of self-blame almost uncontrollably crept into her heart.

As a "white knight" dedicated to protection, every time she fails in her duty, she feels ashamed and lost.

"It doesn't matter." Ashlee just shook her head gently, as if she hadn't lost an arm and hadn't been hurt at all. "I am an abandoned person, a loser. As such, I have no right to die, and no possibility of ascending to heaven - so don't worry about me, Luna."

"What nonsense are you talking about, really..."

Lunisia stretched out her hand towards the half-broken arm, trying to pour divine energy into it and use holy healing to repair Asheselin's wound. However, the facts confused her. Her holy healing could not have any effect on Asheselin's broken arm, let alone repair the damaged part. She couldn't even penetrate it.

"How is this going?"

It was not because of the extremely simple reason that "Aishelin is a mechanical puppet and therefore cannot be repaired by holy healing". In fact, the holy healing used by Lunicia was more of a conceptual repair than a treatment. As long as she subconsciously assumed that the creature had life, it could be repaired by holy healing. Of course, the undead, which were essentially incompatible with divine energy, were exceptions.

"This is a punishment, Luna."

Lunicia looked up blankly, and Ashatherine was smiling at her. There was no meaning in her smile, only uncontrollable loss and emptiness.